Bank of Cyprus has entered into a partnership with Gemalto, an international provider of digital security solutions, to offer its customers a convenience of combined EMV and biometric recognition card for making contact and contactless payments at the points of sales.

Biometric recognition solution embedded into the card uses the fingerprint authentication instead of entering PIN codes for authorizing transactions performed on the card. The card, according to the official statement made by the Bank of Cyprus, is compatible with existing contactless payment terminals already in use across the country. During the payment process a card holder puts his/her finger on the sensor which reads the data and matches it with the recorded biometric information entered by the card holder when subscribing for the card.

The technology enables the card to get power directly from the payment terminal, thus, requiring no additional battery, which means that customers may perform their transactions without concerns about limits on the power. Besides, as the bank says, there are no limits on the number of possible transactions.

Customers may subscribe for the new card at any branch of the Bank of Cyprus nationwide through the dedicated tablet provided by Gemalto. The biometric data of a card holder is then recorded onto the card directly and is not stored elsewhere, which ensures higher level of privacy protection.